Today is a day that makes me fucking hate to be widowed. Scratch that, there aren't ever days that I'm like, "Oh yea, I am one sexy ass widow and proud of it!" But some days I feel empowered, more compassionate, more knowledgeable, more sympathetic, empathetic, stronger, all of these really positive things as a result of what I have survived. Today is not one of those days. I didn't have a great day at work. I had to physically restrain a kid and that always sucks, especially when it results in back pain.  My car is falling apart, and as I have a shit-for-pay job I am not really able to give it the TLC it deserves, and therefore Optimus Prime is swiftly becoming a hooptie. Not super fun to "dip through the hood" in (as KC would have said). I am coming towards the end of a very stressful class in school and I am not feeling very confident in what I will turn in on Saturday. I have started to see a boy, socially. This, I think, is really what is causing me inner turmoil. I like him. It is unexpected. He was unexpected. I really like being with him and I find myself thinking of him often. He is terribly kind, and attentive, and funny, and sweet. He is much different physically than any one who I have ever dated in the past, though I guess I never really did have a "type."  Things are progressing slowly which is great, I need it that way, but I am just so bad at this. I never thought I would have to do it again, and frankly, I was never really any good at this dating stuff. KC was, he taught me how to be with him. This new guy is different, which is great, but similar, which is also great, but weird. I worry about texting him too much or bugging him. I just don't fucking know how to do this! I don't know how to talk to him about my feelings because it would make the feelings really real to say them out loud.
All of this is another reminder of my loss all the time, not that I need any reminders, but still. I am trying so hard to be open and just let things unfold naturally, and I think I am being successful in that when in the moment with him. I am just scared. There are implications and things that pop into my head all the time, like introducing him to family and friends who knew KC. I worry so much about how these people in my life may respond to him---or me with him---and what they will think about all of it. I guess I just wonder how people could possibly understand the co-existence of romantic feelings in such a way when I don't understand it myself. I still love and miss KC desperately, but yet I have these new romantic feelings about another man, a good man, and I don't even really know what these feelings mean, so how could I possibly expect him to understand, or my parents, or KC's dad and sister, or anyone? Will people feel that I am betraying KC's memory? That is the last thing I want. Will I be able to really fall in love again? I don't know. If I can't answer these questions, maybe I shouldn't be dating anyone yet. But the fact remains, the new guy makes me happy when I am with him, and I continue wanting to be with him, so it wouldn't be true to me to stop this.....right? Or am I justifying neglectful and disrespectful and hurtful behavior to meet my own selfish and primal needs? What I do know is it that it feels good to be wanted, to be doted upon, to be touched sweetly and held gently. I miss these things and I want them again, but maybe I don't really get them again. Maybe it isn't in the cards. But then again, maybe it is. I'm not putting pressure on this new *relationship* nor am I operating under the delusion that this dude has to be the man I marry in order to entertain the thought of dating him, but it is just tough to not go there. So here I am, delirious after a long, shit day, and questioning everything I know and feel while successfully avoiding writing my paper. What do I do? Fuck if I know. Happy hump day, hahahaha....


*** I seriously doubt it, but New Guy, if you're reading this, please don't get scared away! I am not quite as crazy as my blog might make me sound, this is merely my stream of consciousness and mode of catharsis to release all my muhfuckin crazy. If you are reading this, and you are NOT scared away, I guess we got something good goin...so there's that.

Ramblin.

The holidays are rapidly approaching and I am getting exponentially weaker by the day. Thanksgiving is difficult, a KC proposed to me the day after what used to be my favorite holiday. Now it is sullies with bad memories and heartache. Though this year will be a little different, my niece and nephew will be joining the family table for the first time. I swear to *God* babies are like little tiny human prozac...they just make shit better. I feel like things have been going along pretty well, even with thoughts of KC heavy on my mind lately, I have been handling the thoughts well and even been able to get out some joyful feelings from what are normally hurtful, painful shitty fucking feelings. I have widowed friends, ya know? I have lots of widowed women in my life who are beautiful, passionate, sweet, empathetic, amazing women who lift me up all of the time. I have become a counselor to them as they have been to me. My good friend recently lost her father and her mother and I now share this title: Widow. It's so strange, this instant connection. This bond forged from unimaginable pain. But it is real, just as real as any other bond forged for any good reason. I am lucky to know and learn and grow these women. We are lucky to have found this community of support and hope. One of the women whom I have met at Camp Widow is recently engaged and elated about life. I envy her that, but more than envy I am happy and hopeful. Whatever is right for me will happen, and until then: my mission is ME. I am reconnecting with ME. I am getting healthy. I am getting strong. I am re-affirming that I am a woman who is worthy of love. I am finding out how to look sexy, feel sexy, exude sexy, and BE sexy because I want to and I can. I am unabashedly who I am. And I like it. The rest....well....the rest will surely come. And if not....fuck it. I'll look good.........

Who's that girl?! It's MEG!

My life tends to play out like a poorly written sitcom. I have weird shit happen to me and it always seems to work out alright, ya know, as long as people are alive. I decided to take my future relationship life into my own hands and make myself a little more available to men. I reconnected with a guy from high school recently and wanted to hang out with him so we made plans. It was funny, because I didn't know if it was going to be a date or just like, two old friends hanging out. I thought about it and came to the conclusion that it must be a date, it seemed that I had asked this man out and he accepted. Then the night came that we were going to get together, and he invited his friend. Ok, well at least now i know! Not a date, haha.. Granted, it's an old friend of mine as well, and in the end I had a great time out with two really awesome dudes. But I just thought it was pretty funny...and it gets a little better. If you have read this blog for a while, you may know that I had been asked out around new years by a friend of a friend who was a bartender in town. He and I went out on one date and I never heard from him again.  Yea, so his bar where I was supposed to meet my "date" last night.... Let's just line up all the men who have rejected me in one room, get it over with! Put me out of my misery! This dating thing is bound to be bumpy, I hope I can begin to regain some semblence of intuition for men who are interested versus men who just want to be nice...haha. Maybe this is all part of the fun, the point is, my awkward ass is back out there on the market. Even if it is one calamity after another, I am confident in my ridiculousness, and it at least entertains me. I know it won't take me down because I have endured far worse than rejection in my life, and grown through it all. It's all an adventure, and I am in it!

Doin it

Heading down to see my Santa Barbara family this weekend, KC's dad is going to take me fishing for the first time since KC and I fished together in AK. I am a little nervous, but really excited too. I feel like I am in a pretty good place heading down there right now, I am taking control over a lot in my life and trying to do my best to say YES more often. That is what KC did, and that is what I want to do. It isn't really easy, but I am tired of watching the clock tick by and waiting to feel happy again. If I keep waiting, it's gonna be a long fucking road. I started my life without KC over a year and a half ago, but I don't feel like I have done very much living. It's damn well time to start. I am saying yes, I am getting healthy and strong, I am opening my heart to love and life. I am achieving goals and finishing school and saying what I mean and doing what feels right. I am living a life. I wish it could be with KC by my side, but I don't have that choice anymore. So I will do better than make do. I will live. I will love. I will experience. I will grow. Starting, now.

Going

I need to get moving. I am 28 years old, widowed for a year and a half. I feel as though I keep watching people live life in front of me as though I am watching a program on TV. Things are happening to the people around me and I am plugging along I guess, but I don't know that I am really living, like I was with KC. I need to get back out there, I need to feel love again in many senses. I have these goals (finishing school, getting my own apartment, but more importantly having a family). I operate under no delusion that this will be an easy task, but I want it. I want it so badly. I miss the little things about being in a relationship, like buying little presents, holding hands and stealing a kiss in a movie theater, walking hand in hand down the street and even those stupid little fights about laundry and dishes). It's tough to see that possibility, it makes me mourn KC even more. But there is one thing I know about KC; he wanted me to be a mother. I need to be a mother. So, off I go, into the world, truly open to the possibility of meeting someone again for the first time. How bad could it be?

Goodbye, Aunt Carolyn

I learned yesterday that my Aunt passed away in her sleep. She had been suffering from a very aggressive and painful type of lung cancer, and now her suffering is over, and the suffering of my family continues on. She was an incredible example to the world of what a woman should be; kind, intelligent, funny, beautiful and grounded. Aunt Carolyn never took any shit, not from her husband (my awesome Uncle Danny), her three kids, or anyone. She could party with the best of them but maintained responsibility with grace and calm. She was a real woman, and she cared for my family when we lost KC. I will do the same for her family now.
Last night I had a little chat with my new niece and told her about her Aunt Carolyn, about how great of an Aunt she was to me, and how because of her I will be a great Aunt to her. I hope I can live up to that promise.
Goodbye Carolyn, I will feel the love you have given my family in my heart until my time on this earth is over.

It is time to....

“You can shed tears that he is gone,
or you can smile because he has lived.
You can close your eyes and pray that he'll come back,
or you can open your eyes and see all he's left.
Your heart can be empty because you can't see him,
or you can be full of the love you shared.
You can turn your back on tomorrow and live yesterday,
or you can be happy for tomorrow because of yesterday.
You can remember him only that he is gone,
or you can cherish his memory and let it live on.
You can cry and close your mind,
be empty and turn your back.
Or you can do what he'd want:
smile, open your eyes, love and go on.”

 

 These last couple of lines are what are hitting me the hardest right now. It is only through love that we live, and without love there is no life. I know KC's love, and will know it forever. It is how I know that I am alive. But it is time to open my eyes, love, and go onward. I am not quite sure how, but it is time. 

My meaning of life

I think I finally got it.

I don't think everyone really gives the meaning of life too much thought. If we all did, everyone would just be gluttonous hedonistic wretches, it would be Greek gods all over the place seeking pleasure and avoiding pain. But instead, we work, we educate ourselves, we delay pleasure and work to provide ourselves with a break. My job, it seems, is to work so that others can be blissfully unaware of how shitty life is. I should suffer quietly so that I don't take away precious moments of pleasure from others. So I work at a job that I lovehate so that the children for whom I work will have the potential for a better, more pleasure-filled life. I smile through tears so that other people around me don't know the extent to which I am suffering inside, and therefore they can be happy. This is the part I need to work on, however, because I am not as good as I would like to think at hiding my feelings; heart on my sleeve and all that. So my journey is in suffering to promote health and wellness and general subjective well being in others. I can get down with that I guess, but I hope that eventually my pain will soften and I will be able to feel that hearty warmth in my heart again. Love. It's all I want, it's all I live for.
That is the meaning of life.
Love.

So tell me what to do when the meaning of life is taken away. Someone? Anyone?

wait, wasthat, holy shit...

There is a solar eclipse happening right now. I made a little pinhole viewer out of a cereal box and my dad, mom and I have been checking it out for like an hour and a half. It felt like such a nice cool way to spend an afternoon with my family, it made my heart warm. I was sharing a rare experience with my parents, and it felt good.

Then I walked outside and a man was driving by my house. I glanced in the car and I SWEAR it was KC's doppelganger, his fucking living twin or something, driving right in front of my house. He was even wearing a backwards hat and leaning in the car the same EXACT way KC did when he was driving. In the span of a millisecond I felt this huge surge of excitement and hope and dread and despair. I know that KC is gone forever, but eyes do play tricks I suppose. I thought for the smallest second that KC was back, and he was in a white BMW, and he was here for me. And all at the same time he's gone again.

Fuck my life, man. The very second things seem to start lining up, it gets thrown again. I wonder when I can relax again, feel connected again, feel lit up from the inside like I did when I was living with KC and not living in constant pain.

I am reaching for some sort of irony or parallel or meaning in this rare, solar eclipse. Is it so simple as blocking the light from my life? Darkness taking over where there once was light? the good news? The world keeps turning and the sun becomes visible yet again, I guess my eclipse just hasn't finished yet....

Painful Regression

It feels like I am relapsing in grief. I thought I was "moving on" for a bit there, I liked it. I went about my work and my social life, going a few hours at a time forgetting that I had to take off my engagement ring because KC is dead. I was getting happy again. I went on dates a few times. I enjoyed the company of another man (well, boy really, as it turned out) and took comfort in the newly found realization that I may be able to have a crush on a guy while still holding on to the True Love that I shared with KC. But now, man. I am consumed with loneliness in a way I never have known. It breaks barriers like a child coloring outside of the lines. Reckless abandon. It crosses into every single moment of my life. The most joyful moments are tarnished by a heavy weight: I will never be truly loved again. This is not to say that I am not loved now, I know that I am. This isn't even to say that I will never know romantic love from a man again, I believe that I will. I just am not entirely sure that I will ever be able to again fully open my heart and leave myself vulnerable to this type of loss ever again. If I cannot open my heart to love someone else, I surely can never feel new love again, even if it feels true to the person on the other end.
This heaviness, it's weighs down every part of my day. Today I noticed that walking seemed tiresome. Just walking, not even walking briskly. I remember this feeling because it is how it felt to walk anywhere for the first 3 or 4 months after KC died. Like each step was a fucking miracle of science, how DOES she do it?! I am feeling this way again, 17 months later. I am feeling this weight in every moment and I don't know what to do about it. I try to delve into it, but I go numb. I try and distract myself, but I find that the more I try not to think about it the more I see KC everywhere. If it isn't KC I see, it's an engagement, a pregnancy, an ode to a life that was robbed from KC and I before we even got the chance to plan it. I hate that when I find out a friend got engaged that I instantly feel terror in my bones: I hope no one dies. I hate that when a friend of mine tells me they are pregnant, I instantly feel dark, angry jealousy. I hate that when I look at my niece and I hold her and sing to her I am thinking about how I will likely never experience birthing a beautiful child like her. I think about how she will never know her Uncle KC. I think about how all I want to do is protect her from the feeling I have in my heart, that bitter, sad, angry, empty feeling of grief, but I know that I can't do that.
So what do I do about it?
How do I get better?
How do I "move on."
How do you escape desperate, desperate loneliness when the only one who can take that feeling away....



is gone.

I've been so lonely, I could die

I am so fucking tired of this. Every day I get up, I go to work, I work my ass off just to come home and do homework. I have no money. I have no man. I have no real love or affection in my life and I just am starting to think what the fuck is the point? I have a student who is so dependent on my ever day for everything and she tells me today that she can't talk to me because she doesn't trust me as much as some other staff that she sees for an hour a day. Fuck that little bitch of a kid. Maybe that's not the PC thing to say, but this is an uncensored blog so get over it. that is how i feel right now. I invest a lot of myself into all my kids, but her especially and i feel like i got punched in the gut for that one and it's bull shit. Then I check my facebook and every one is god damned dying, all the time. It's getting to the point where if I hear someone call me by my whole name instead of a nickname or an abbreviation of my name I automatically think someone is dying or dead. How is this mentality fair for someone my age?
And fuck me, the loneliness. It's like my body aches for the loneliness. I miss KC and his endless affection, I knew how good I had it but I couldn't possibly have appreciated it enough when I still had it. not like I do now anyway and I just miss it so fucking much. I am so afraid that I will be like this forever. I know it isn't likely the case but it is just how i feel right now, no light at the end of a tunnel, just a scary, lonely, dark tunnel with twists and turns and potholes and work. I am tired all the time. I am starting to have very odd dreams, even dreams of people pity-proposing to me, and you know what I do? I accept. I accept a marriage proposal to someone I am not in love with because I am tired of being alone and I am scared no one is ever going to love me again. I miss being in love with someone who is here to love me back. That is what it boils down to, I guess. I miss being loved. And there is no end in sight.

back and forth

How do you know what to do, to make the right decision? When everything is wrong because the one you love is gone way too soon, a lot of questions seem to have no answer. I go back and forth in my head constantly and about so many different things; from the idea of dating again to what to eat for lunch. It is seemingly one of the more pervasive symptoms of grief, I haven't been able to get past this part yet, this unsure feeling that whatever the choice I am making is the wrong one. KC's birthday is coming up next week and I decided I was going to be with friends and go to opening weekend for the Giants. I will be surrounded with people I love in a sporting event, and I know it would be something KC would enjoy. But somehow I feel something in me that says I should just stay home and cry alone in my room. I'm nervous about it. The thing is, nothing that could happen could be worse than anything I have already survived so what am I nervous about? I will be with great friends in a fun place, but what if I have a panic attack? What if I can't stop crying? Well, who cares?! Being around my friends is a better idea than locking myself up and hiding from the world, so I am going to go despite my worries. If i cry, I cry. If I laugh, I won't let myself feel guilty. I am everything I am because KC loved me and he loved me because I love life, so I am determined to keep being the girl that KC loved. What better way to celebrate the most amazing man I ever knew? just hope it's the right choice, here i go again, back and forth....

Sometimes it sucks to be right

one of the first things I can remember saying after I heard that KC died was "it's never going to be ok."
I thought later, perhaps it was hyperbole.
Nope. I was right.

and tragedy strikes yet again

An old friend of mine, actually he and I dated before KC and I met, his little brother died yesterday. He was 19. His body was found under a large bridge in San Diego, and no one knows what happened. As soon as I heard this devastating news I was brought back to the feelings I had when KC was missing. I still don't know what was worse, the not knowing or the knowing. There is a lot that I will never know about what happened to KC, I don't know what his last words were, or his final thoughts. I don't know if he suffered much, or even exactly what happened to get him stuck. We will never know. Maybe that is for the best, but maybe not. wonder is a tough thing when it is something so powerful, so all encompassing. Before we found out that KC's equipment malfunctioned I envisioned the worst. I pictured him stuck, his tank caught and he was unable to free himself. I pictured him panicking, suffering and terrified. I know now that he didn't suffer long, and that brings me some peace but it doesn't take away the nightmares i had, and still have.
I can't believe that this is what my old friend's family is dealing with. I can't believe another family's lives are ruined and they don't even know what happened. It fucking breaks my heart in half. I can picture them, in the same place I was just over a year ago. I want to tell them it will be ok, but I can't. I want to tell them I know what they are feeling but I don't. I want to tell them he is in a better place but that is bullshit and they know it. I just want to hold Kev, be there for him, and let him see and feel my empathy, wordless and stuck in the knowing that this shit fucking sucks and no one and nothing can help, and somehow let all that help him. I want to bake cookies for the family and read them affirmations and guide them in meditation so they may quiet their minds for even a moment, and maybe feel a modicum of relief. But, I can't. And ultimately none of that will help. When tragedy strikes we have 1 choice and 1 choice only: die, or keep living without the one we lost. It's a shitty choice. It's so limited and limiting and your don't want to choose either one, but it is the choice with which we are left. I know Kev, though we haven't been close for some time, I know him. He will make the tough choice to keep going. I just wish I had learned something helpful through my loss, something that could help him or his family. I have wracked my brain all day to think of the right thing to tell him, but it isn't there. There can't be a right thing to say, because what happened is so wrong. There isn't a right answer when everything is wrong. So right now, all I can do is cry.

Can it happen again?

I am really wondering whether lightening can strike twice. I hate that I am so preoccupied with this. I have so much going on, work, school, a new niece, bills to pay, awesome friends to hang out with and make me happy. I am even currently on vacation in beautiful sunny Florida and all I can think about is boys. I think about KC most, but lately it has been a lot about how I will never get to be with him again. That breaks my heart every time the thought pops into my head, but more because I don't think I will ever fall in love again. I want it so badly, too. I loved being in love. I still love love, even though love hurt me worse than anything I coulda fucking imagined but I want it back. It's like love is an abusive boyfriend that keeps hurting me and I keep coming back for more, trying to justify why I stay. But the fact remains, I was a good girlfriend. I was a good fiance and I would have made a fucking awesome wife. I want to be able to be that for someone, I want to be that for me. I am not ashamed that I want a husband, I am however, fairly certain that I am not going to get the chance. Guys are fucking douchebags, and it is SO hard to find a good one, let alone a good one to whom I am attracted and actually likes me back. What are the odds that I would ever fall in love with an amazing man who has fallen in love with me, let alone the odds of that happening twice?
Look I am not claiming doomsday bullshit where I think I am just going to be totally alone for the rest of my days, wearing black staring out a window looking at the rain pensively. I am sure I will date guys. I may even have relationships again. I just don't think it is probable for me to think I will find another man who is perfect for ME like KC was. It's a numbers game, and I am on the losing end. It's a fucking bummer.
Fun fact, my mother drove me to the airport on my way out of cali and on to Florida. she said I am not allowed to fall in love with some dude out here and stay here.....I cracked up. Like that could happen.....

tried and failed

I tried dating. I went on a few dates with a few guys. I went on a few dates with one guy in particular. I feel empty and ashamed and deeply sad for what I had and lost. The ease in which we interacted, the commonality we shared while maintaining our independent selves. It was so easy with KC, right away. It felt right from the get go and I will never have that again. I will never have him again. I am only solidifying in my mind that I am destined to be alone. I can't ever settle for less than what and who KC was, and it is impossible to have him again. So where does that leave me? Alone.
And it isn't as if i am constantly depressed, I have joyful times for sure. But the level I was at before, I won't get there again. I know it. And that is a tough pill to swallow.
I feel sad today, after a date last night. I think that's just how it is going to be for me. Not everyone gets to be truly fulfilled and happy. I am not one of the lucky ones. And that's neither good or bad, it just is.

Moving Onward....forrealthistime

I may never be as happy as I was when I was with KC. I accept that. However, it isn't only 1 or 100, there are plenty of numbers in between. I think I can be happy again sharing affection with another man. I want that very much even though it scares the hell out of me. Just because I may not be as happy as I was, I can be happier than I am now. I'm alive, I am capable of love and I am lovable. Time to make it happen.

Get out!

Get out of your own head, for like, one minute! Get out get out get out!!!! Just let things happen and feel good when you feel good, quit thinking about everything so much!! Get ouuuuuuttt!!!!!